empty bottles: k.m.(under construction)

old wounds meet new - chapter 1

"If Marcel and Astrid find out a witch lured more Originals back into town, my people will be slaughtered" the witch Sabine panicked. Elijah's eyes flared the second he heard that second name.

"Astrid is here?"

His voice however, turned into words breathed as he heard mocking howls echo throughout the French Quarter streets and used his vampiric speed to pull Sabine up to a nearby balcony, prioritising the mortal woman's safety over a Mikaelson family reunion.

He had been alive a millennia. What was five more minutes?

It was nearing the end of the night in the Quarter, the locals and the tourists retiring inside. Jane Anne Deveraux had been found hiding in cargo before it set down the Mississippi. Astrid had this energy about her that night that haunted even her men, there was something.. original in her step.

"Well well well!, what have we here?" Astrid let out a laugh as she sauntered down Dauphine Street with her son at her side, "I gotta tell you Soph, this street corner isn't proving to be the luckiest for your family tonight"

Her voice struck Elijah. That sweet, succulent tone that used to be oh so innocent. That faithful night in 1919. Watching as his sister in law hang limp with a stake through her stomach, his best friend - who he thought had been slain by his father - stood proud mere feet away from him, and not that far from her missing King. He watched almost in denial.

"Not half an hour ago, Astrid and I had to teach your sister here a little lesson." Marcel tilted his head to one side, that signature grin of his that always sent the witches running sick plastered against his face like words on a gravestone and Astrid let out a hearty laugh.

Hidden from behind the balcony, Elijah let out a little breath of defeat. Something in him prayed that Astrid had not fallen as far as Niklaus but clearly his faith was misplaced. He heard it in the way she spoke, that viperlike attitude that once complimented NIklaus's so sweetly.

"We're putting her to rest" Sophie's voice sounded broken, the loss of her elder sister clearly running deep as she sat hunched over the corpse, "Leave us alone". Astrid's eyes fixed onto Sophie's and she saw an opportunity. Her husband had an interest in the Deveraux sisters.

Astrid did not like that.

"We never said you could move the body." Astrid proclaimed, her tongue dripping with condescension as she put on a mocking pout, "Matter of fact, I left her here for a reason: send a message. I was not aware our rules were flimsy things to flout at will, were you Marcel?" Astrid looked over her shoulder to Marcel as she stood over Sophie dressed all in black like some symbol of death. "I have to agree with you, Astrid. And yet a little birdy informed me that Jane-Anne was cooking up something magically delicious"

The two were enjoying this, Elijah realised rather quickly and it made even him feel sick. Astrid enjoyed this idea that she could strike fear into the witches, like finally she had some semblance of control over something. The suited vampire found himself questioning as he listened in with his hand over Sabine's so she did not do anything stupid - already psychoanalysing his darling sister in law. She'd been tugged along by the democracy of the Mikaelsons since she was only a werewolf.

Is this what had become of her?

"Oh yeah. While I have you, a little Original trivia. What is Astrid's last name?"